Ebba Brahe

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Ebba Brahe (March 16, 1596 - January 5, 1674) was a lady-in-waiting in the Swedish court, countess, and the mistress of the future king Gustavus Adolphus.

[edit] Marriage, relationship with the king

She was born as the daughter of Magnus Brahe and Britta Stensdotter Leijonhuvud and was sent to court at the age of fifteen to spend some time as a lady-in-waiting to the queen dowager Christina of Holstein-Gottorp to become accustomed to the ways of the fashionable world before marriage.

By the age of 16, in 1613, she was a mistress to the then future king, Gustavus Adolphus; this was by no means an official position, but it was well known in the court, and by the letters exchanged between them, it seems that they were both equally in love with each other. There were serious plans for a marriage, and the young king would not have found this odd, as three previous queens, Margareta Leijonhufvud, Katarina Stenbock and Gunilla Bielke had also been noblewomen, but these plans were prevented by the dowager queen, who was the real ruler during her son's first years and who wanted him to have an arranged marriage of political convenience. The dispute between the dowager queen, the king and Ebba about marriage continued until 1615 and has been the subject of romantic plays, stories and poems for centuries.

The most famous trivia about this dispute is the following; the dowager queen once passed a window, followed by Ebba Brahe. On the windowpane, she wrote with a diamond ring, as a hint of the plans which they did not discuss openly, One thing you want, one thing you shall; that is the way in cases such as this, and left. Ebba Brahe then wrote in reply: I am happy with what I have, and thank my God for the grace of that. By this, she accepted that the relationship with the king could never be official.

On June 24, 1618 she married Count Jacob De la Gardie, although her relationship with Adolphus continued, (in secret), until his death in 1632.

After her husband's death in 1652 she successfully petitioned Queen Christina I of Sweden to found the city of Jakobstad in Finland, named in honour of her late husband. A street in Jakobstad, Ebba Brahe Esplanaden, has been named after her.

As a widow, she became one of the many independent powerful female landlords, who occupy a significant place in the local legends of Sweden during the 16th and 17th centuries, such as Barbro Påhle, Sophia Drake, Margareta Hvitfeldt and Margaretha von Ascheberg, and spent her days managing her many estates and bought many more, especially from Skåne, that became Swedish in 1658 and had many large estates left behind when the Danish nobility left Skåne. She also played an influential part at court, and was believed to have an influence on queen Christina of Sweden; in 1651, the historian Messenius and his son accused her of having persuaded queen Christina not to marry by using witchcraft, but such an accusation could not be accepted about a noblewoman and they were instead decapitated for treason.

[edit] Family

Her marriage with Jacob produced 14 children, six of whom lived to maturity. None of her children are believed to have been fathered by King Gustavus Adolphus. Those living to adulthood were:

Magnus Gabriel De la Gardie (1622 - 1686) Lord High Chancellor of the Privy Council of Sweden
Maria Sofia De la Gardie (Jakobsdotter) (1627 - 1694)
Jakob Kasimir De la Gardie (1629 - 1658)
Pontus Fredrik De la Gardie (1630 - 1692)
Christina Catharine de la Gardie (1632 - 1704), married Gustaf Otto Stenbock, mother of Magnus Stenbock
Axel Julius De la Gardie (1637 - 1710), Field Marshal and Governor-General over Estonia